The semiconductor industry has experienced rapid growth due to improvements in the integration density of a variety of electronic components (e.g., transistors, diodes, resistors, capacitors, etc.). For the most part, this improvement in integration density has come from shrinking the semiconductor process node (e.g., shrinking the process node towards the sub-20 nm node).
Cheaper, more area-efficient integrated components have aided a shift in DC-DC converters to switched-mode architectures. While typically requiring more control circuitry than linear converters, switched-mode converters can be designed for higher power efficiency.
Electrostatic discharge (ESD) is a danger to most integrated circuits (ICs) that occurs when a large amount of charge is built up suddenly at one or more nodes of the IC. ESD protection circuits mitigate ESD events, and prevent damage to, or destruction of, internal circuitry of the IC. For example, an ESD circuit may detect the charge, disconnect the internal circuitry from the source of the charge, and then direct the charge through special electrical paths to ground.